The Eye of the Storm
by Whovian-Shitsuji
Summary: William gets stuck in a freak storm, forcing him to take shelter in the dank shop of the Undertaker. What lays in wait?
1. Chapter 1

It began as a warm, sunny day boasting a crystal blue sky, which led many to believe that it would stay this way. Alas, according to the cold hands of fate, dark rumbling storm clouds rolled in at breakneck speed. After a mere half hour the sun had been muffled by black and gusts of wind swung the trees around in a mad dance.  
This and the sudden ocean falling upon their heads caused the many groups of people to flee their pleasant outings and seek shelter before they were left looking like packs of drowned rats. Fear of bad weather was such a human worry. A few clouds and a bucket or two of rain did nothing to scare reapers such as William T. Spears.  
Spears, such a proper name for this stoic, as they seemed to come jutting out of his cold green eyes whenever he was displeased. The mere adjusting of his glasses, or straightening of his impeccable suit, meant doom for the unfortunate reapers near him. Nothing was ever helped by waving a red flag in front of this proverbial bull.  
While there was work to be done, William could not let petty rain interrupt him. It was during times like these that he found himself thanking the Technologies Research Department (a small branch of the Library). They were the ones who had made the water resistant spray that coated his lenses and kept fog and mist from building up on them. And with that small problem pushed aside, everything should have gone to plan…were it not for the drastic change in the sky.  
The first in a long series of cracks resounded beside William. Alone, it would not have been such a distraction, but together the cacophony drew his attention. Chunks of ice, hail, the size of a grown man's palm came plummeting to the earth, greeting it swiftly as an old, seldom seen friend.  
William knew quite immediately that he should be worried by this new twist when one that came down beside his food cracked the tile of the roof he was standing on. A split second of contemplation passed before he leaped into action, running across the roof and using his long, branch cutter scythe to fend off the missiles.  
'Focus.'  
This approach was quite successful, until he had to jump over a very wide gap between buildings. His defense failed and one of the chunks of ice smashed into the right top of his skull. A sharp pain flooded William's head and threw him off balance, sending him plummeting to the ground. In this state of vertigo William lacked his usual cat like grace and fell unceremoniously on one leg, resulting in him slipping and crashing down onto his back.  
'Cover.'  
This purely human instinct kicked in, coming to the forefront of his muddled mind. His leg was damaged, he could tell, this was obvious enough. William reached for his fallen scythe and, upon grabbing it, plunged the blade between cracks in the cold cobblestone. This created for him a pole on which he heaved himself up.  
His make shift cane, 'A horrible use for a scythe', served well enough to get him to down the narrow alley and to the rows of East End shops. So many were dingy, most were locked when he tried them, but one. William turned the creaking handle and pushed the door open. Before the impending darkness took over his mind he was greeted by a comforting, familiar site. His last sense was a pair of arms catching him before he fell to the floor.

…

The storm continued waged its eternal battle against itself outside when William came to. He allowed himself some time to simply listen to his surroundings. Sound is a wonderful device that can tell you where you are, if only you are attentive enough a listener.  
Even from within the dusty shop he could hear thunder ripping across the sky and rain pounding relentlessly against the tinted windows. But now that he was under cover of a roof and walls, this sound was muffled. The forefront of his hearing was dominated by pleasant, almost mad humming that floated through the shop. The clink of glass. And accompanying its sister sounds the sweet scent of over sugared black tea wafted his way. His last memories had served him well in their accuracy and he was exactly where he expected to be.  
William opened his eyes and the blur of dull colors before him made him realize the missing weight of his glasses. He looked from side to side and this only revealed dark chestnut walls and golden hinges that must have been attached to a lid.  
'How typical,' he thought, 'for him to put me in a coffin.'  
William allowed himself to come to an upright position slowly, fending off the neon worms that floated across his vision. Blinking a few times resolved this problem for him, but of course it did not help his horrid vision any further. He reached up to feel the point at which the hail had hit him. His straight brown hair hid them from view, but he could feel a three inch line of stitches going from above his cheek bone and nearing the top of his head. A dull ache surrounded it, but it was bearable in every sense of the word.  
"Ah, you're awake!" This happy cry came from a man cloaked in black with a top hat adorning his head full of silver locks. None other than Undertaker himself, once the model reaper and a legend, was rushing to William's side with a science beaker filled to the brim with tea. It never ceased to amaze William how charitable Undertaker was. He could live like a king and be adored by everyone in the Library; yet he instead loitered in a moldy old shop giving strangers information or funerals for nothing more than a few laughs.  
"Yes, thank you for allowing me in here," he said wearily and took the offered tea. Somehow, since the first time he had visited the shop as a student, Undertaker was able to get his tea perfectly right. Black tea, steeped for five minutes, sweetened with a spoonful of honey. His chilled body was still damp, but any cold he felt was washed away by sipping the hot tea. It was on the brink of burning his tongue, but did nothing of the sort but warm his insides.  
"I couldn't let me favorite stick in the mud stay out in the rain," he said with a small giggle. "Especially with those sores you managed to get yourself!" He peered at the stitches and then at William's wrapped leg, which blood had started to dye the white cotton bandage pink. "I don't like that it takes injuries to get you to visit me now. Why were you playing outside in this storm, anyway?"  
"You already know the answer to that. I put my work before anything else." Undertaker simply grinned in response.  
"That kind of attitude will end up making you look like me," he said, indicating the permanent stitching that adorned his face and throat. "And there's faaaaaaaaar more where that came from!"  
"I am sure. You had to work during the Black Plague. Demonic scum were crawling all over the place to get their hands on a soul that we were too thinly spread to harvest in time."  
"Oh, don't remind me of my age." Undertaker picked himself up his own tea, a black sludge because of all the sugar that had been mixed in, and perched himself on the end of the coffin William still lay in.  
The windows were set ablaze for a moment as lightning flashed across the sky. She was dancing to the roaring baritone of her partner, thunder, and such a vain creature was she, having to draw the attention of all. William watched the window for a long moment as silence settled between them.  
"I will go when the rain lightens," William said to break the silence. Undertaker's giggling paused for a moment and his smile, it seemed, almost wavered.  
"I think you will leave when I say you can," he said softly. "I would rather you not get injured any further."  
The starkness of his voice in those words startled William. In the years they had known each other he had never heard Undertaker sound so…serious. Serious was a word that should never be even remotely associated with Undertaker. Yet, here it needed to be used. Here even _frightening_ could be used.  
"Sir," William said slowly, "I mean no disrespect, but I have to get back to the Library-"  
"You also have to not end up with your leg broken! That would be a rather messy situation!" His light heartedness returned, much to William's relief. "And you being a complete idiot is what will cause that! I know you're smarter than that."  
Of course he knew. Undertaker was his tutor and friend for years while William was a reaper in training. He was the reason he now excelled in everything about the trade, despite concealing himself under the guise of a B student. Once the work had begun, though, their visits had become rare, once every month or two at best.  
'There will be no reasoning with him,' William thought.  
"I will stay then," he said with a sigh of defeat. "But I am blaming you in any reports that I have to make for being out of commission for so long."  
Undertaker laughed loudly, stretching his mouth into an even larger grin. How that was physically possible, William knew not. But coming back to visit after such a long time, and seeing that smile, made him feel a happiness that he so seldom felt.

…

For hours it seemed the two just talked. It had been nearly a full year this time that had gapped their visits and there was much to catch up on. Here William was unafraid to open himself up more, showing more feeling, telling his complaints about some reapers and praises for others. It was a pleasant time for them both.  
The storm was wearing its welcome and had begun to die down. Already the rain was beginning to cease and, when William looked out, the moon peaked through a small crack in the blanket of clouds. His watch read midnight and he knew that Undertaker would never let him leave at this hour, no matter how well the weather improved.  
As William was lost in his own thoughts, Undertaker waltz over and locked the door and windows, bringing heavy black curtains in front of them.  
"We wouldn't want any wary passersby to get curious, do we?" he said with a small laugh.  
"I do not see why that would be a problem," William said, looking over at the former reaper. His breath caught in his throat when he saw that Undertaker had removed the heavy robes and was left in those high boots and skin tight shirt and pants. It showed that, despite his age, the old reaper had not loss the tone of his body brought upon by years of work.  
"Oh, you don't?" Even his demeanor was rapidly changing. His bangs were pushed away from his sparkling green eyes, alight with a fire that William was unfamiliar with. It was something he had glimpsed before in Grell, but never here. Never with his mentor, his idol, his friend.  
And quicker than a human eye could follow, Undertaker was in front of William. He surpassed William in height by almost a full head and this made him almost…intimidating. William opened his mouth to speak, though he knew not what to say. A protest? A question as to what he was doing? But nothing came out. Instead his parted lips were enveloped by Undertaker's warm mouth.  
Nothing. William could do nothing beyond an instinctive jerk backwards, a motion stopped by Undertaker's arms wrapped around his waist and upper back. William was utterly helpless to this embrace, his arms limp by his sides. It was as if he was a young boy again, confused by his surroundings and without a chance of helping himself. Their mouths remained locked together for what seemed, to William, like an eternity before Undertaker pulled his head away.  
Their faces remained in close proximity to one another. Their eyes were locked onto each other and William saw the longing within the depths of those eyes. Something that had been held back for years and only just allowed out. Perhaps Undertaker had been better at controlling his feelings than even William had ever been.  
"Why?" William uttered when his words finally came back to him. "Why me?"  
"Because," Undertaker said, a charming, lustful smile adorning his face, "you have always been mine, since you stepped through that door. I am finally claiming you."  
Nothing more needed to be said as Undertaker pushed William down into the nearest open casket. And, for some reason unknown to him, William felt no urge to fight this. Even as Undertaker slowly unbuttoned his shirt with his teeth, he felt as if this was coming and was meant to happen. He even...welcomed it. Freedom from himself.  
William wrapped his arms around Undertaker's neck and heaved himself up. His lips brushed the elder's ear as he whispered;  
"Take me."


	2. Chapter 2

With morning came a sharp chill throughout the shop, a left over from the storm the night before. Thin lines of ice were scattered across the windows in aimless trails that shone in the sunlight. Outside glass, wood, and chunks of ice were scattered across the streets, many of the buildings surrounding them having been damaged by the storm. Residents of these now mangled homes took an early rise to clean the streets of the carnage.  
However, it was an entirely different cause that finally awoke William T. Spears from a deep sleep. The cold air settled across his body mere minutes after the warmth of his lover had left him, leaving him alone in the roomy casket. As goosebumps plucked up all over his body he awoke to a blurry, dim world and a dull ache in his behind.  
Sitting up proved a difficulty for William, between the vertigo onset by his lack of glasses and any pressure causing the ache to become inflamed, he almost wanted to just roll over and go back to sleep. But no, he could have none of that. Already he had missed half a day of work and he would not be late for the day after that.  
Success smiled on him and he managed to at least get into an upright position, balancing precariously on his knees. Such a feat was awarded by his glasses, free of dust or smear, being slid onto his face by a pair of delicate, long fingered hands. Dominating his now clear vision was a grinning, shirtless Undertaker.  
From the moment he fell through the door the day before, William's glasses had disappeared. He could only assume that Undertaker had put them in a safe place both so they would not come into harm's way and, William could safely assume, as a way to blackmail him had he attempted to leave again. So, the entire night had been a blurry haze and not an unpleasant one.  
Now with the help of his glasses William could finally see Undertaker clearly in this new, once unfamiliar way. Despite his age, Undertaker did not have any of the signs of his body having grown old. He was still very well built, finely toned muscles rippling across his chest and abdomen. It was the kind of body any man, human or otherwise, would gladly sell their soul for.  
But there were several things amiss with his body. Running rampant across his torso were countless thin, white scars like those adorning his face and neck. One in particular caught William's eye. It stretched from his left shoulder down and around to the middle of his back. He had never seen anything of the likes before, even on reapers that had been slaughtered by a demon.  
"You certainly slept in," Undertaker mused, his voice breaking through William's train of thought. "If we don't hurry you'll most certainly be late, my dear! And I _know_ you simply won't stand for the overtime that would cause!" He looked down at William, his eyes feasting on the reaper's exposed body. "Mm...you do need your clothes back, don't you? Such a shame."  
"I don't believe my coworkers would appreciate me walking around nude," he said, his attention just now drawn to how unclothed he was. Shame brought an uncanny redness to his face and he reached to cover himself, only to be stopped by Undertaker's hands around his wrists.  
"I would appreciate it if you would not cover yourself from me," Undertaker said in a soft, sweet voice. "You need not hie from me, my dear. And I want to drink up every image of your perfect body."  
William could do not but gaze up at Undertaker, into his eyes that were so much more brilliant than his own. There was nothing but love in those green pools. Love and honesty, reassurance that William was not something just to be used once and thrown away. He saw there confirmation. He cleared his throat.  
"I do need my clothing, if you have it though," he said in as serious a tone as he could muster. "As you said, I will not tolerate being late."  
Undertaker's laughter rang like a song throughout the shop. It gave life to an otherwise quite dead atmosphere.  
"You're so funny when you try to act serious!" he exclaimed. "Ah, but yes, you can have them back now." Undertaker fetched the neatly folded and freshly ironed suit for William, who promptly pulled himself together until he once again reflected the serious, no nonsense manager that he was.  
William's scythe rested against the wall beside the door and he took it up, inspecting it for what he knew was the impossible scratch or bend in the metal. It was habit and his over protective nature of it that pushed him to do this every time he got into a scrape.  
He reached for the handle of the door, but stopped when arms wrapped around his waist. Undertaker stood behind him, an almost sad smile settling upon his face.  
"Do make sure you don't wait another year to visit me again," he said and kissed William's cheek. "I would miss you so much."  
"I will not wait nearly so long this time," he replied softly, his cheeks flushing despite himself. "But for now I must go."  
William did not allow there to be time for more words. Anything else would make it even more painful to leave. All he wanted was to stay with that old fool and never return to the Library. But his duty was unchanged, despite his secret affair. Breaking out of Undertaker's warm embrace he pushed open the door and bounded away. His thoughts turned from regrets of leaving to the excuses he would have to make when he reached work.


End file.
